This cartoon reflects the fact that on May 17 William Howard Taft had 584 delegates pledged to vote for him at the Republican National Convention in mid-June. The total was 103 votes higher than the majority required for the presidential nomination. Here, he easily outdistances his rival candidates in the cross-country race. Those caught in the rear fence are (left-right): Vice President Charles Fairbanks; Speaker of the House Joseph Cannon of Illinois (bottom rail); Governor Robert La Follette of Wisconsin; Governor Charles Evans Hughes of New York; and Attorney General Philander Knox of Pennsylvania. The fence is covered with advertisements, which poke fun at the candidates: buttermilk highball for straitlaced Fairbanks; “Appalachian Bitters” for North Carolina-born Cannon; a hair tonic (“Whiskerine”) for La Follette and Hughes; and, wood pulp for Knox.